The Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine at Oxford has mortality data.Two nations have >10% mortality rates: Bangladesh (no surprise) and San Marino (completely surrounded by Italy). The USA is 1.43%. That's still scary, but this is not Black Death 2.
Mortality rates by age also conform to existing data: less than 1% of those under 50.
I suspect shelter-in-place will turn out to be the most effective strategy. During the Black Death, homes were quarantine, but this was often ignored as those not yet sick escaped, infecting others. Of course the Black Death was very deadly, so escape from the house did little good.
I think the more important number for planning purposes is the hospitalization rate. This disease has a pretty high one (based on preliminary data, of course) - estimates range from 5% to 20%.
ReplyDeleteIf the hospitals are overrun, the death rate soars. Plus, health care workers get sick and some die.
I suspect the death rate is higher in health care workers because they may get exposed to a much higher dose of virus than most patients. The whistleblower doctor in Wuhan died of the virus at age 34.
FWIW: A master question list from DHS
ReplyDeletehttps://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/mql_sars-cov-2_-cleared-for-public-release_2020_03_25.pdf